Vol 1 Issue 11: 19 Jul 2008

Another session accomplished. A lot of little things were accomplished, most of them having to do with resting/healing up and prepping for further exploration in the underground dwarven city. We've explored or mapped a huge swath of territory in the complex, and every time I think we've come to an edge we find something new. This complex is huge. It truly is a city underground, not as first suspected a mining complex with some living spaces nearby. I think we're currently off in the city portion of it, where we find distinct market sections and clanhold neighborhoods. The territory with wild tunnels, at least that we've seen, is but a small fraction of the entire complex.

At this point I think that we can safely center our maps on the large courtyard in the center of the 2-mile by 60-foot corridor underground. In each section of this corridor, called "A Concourse" and "B Concourse" are mercantile districts, with more shops ringing the courtyard. Intersecting this is another corridor running off at perpendiculars, and a mile up one of those is a clanhold area. My expectation is that the corridor to the opposite direction from the courtyard leads to another clanhold. Our suspicion is that the end of the "B Concourse" is the front door entrance complex to the place. We're not ready to break in there yet; it is guarded. Back at the other end of "A Concourse" is the complex around the chasm and the prison cells. This is all on the "door" side of the prison complex (hanging cages) area. This is just the complex on one side of the chasm.

I am considering to label this "west city", giving the arbitrary distinction to the chasm as a dividing line between east and west. This distinction is pure guesswork.

On the other side of the chasm, "east city", is the portion of the complex explored last week, including the "apartments" and "barracks". This includes the underground river region where we wandered and the tunnels where we fought and nearly everyone was captured. I place all of that territory on the same side of the chasm for the simple fact that we never crossed the chasm during our wanderings AND when we finally discovered the "turkish bath" and its connection to the hot springs, we wound up on that side of the chasm. So deep beneath "east city" is the mines where Matt The Knife fought the Orc Miners, and also in that neighborhood is the Smithy that we carefully avoided (thanks to Matt The Knife being locked up safe in prison).

I think we're getting the hang of navigating around this complex. Every turn is still an adventure in itself. My guess is that from the clanholds there ought to be some connection back to the prison guard area (the "torture room", or for Reuben's sake the "love shack"). Ought to; maybe not necessarily is. Also, the clanhold areas are where I'd expect to find lots of family types and craftsmen and worker-bees for the dwarf city, so is there a connection from the dwarfholds to more mines? It seems that the Orc Shaman and his crew reside on this "east city" side of the chasm; I'm convinced we're going to run into them at every turn.

We ended early, preparing to head up a new hallway out of the dwarfholds. I have a bad feeling about this.